The Startup Ideas Podcast - Set Up Claude Skills in 21 Mins (for Non-Technical People)

Starting point is 00:00:00 This is the beginner's guide to actually setting up Claude Skills. I'm going to make it super easy for you to understand how to use it, why it's important. I'll start by why it's important. You will be able to get way more out of Claude if you use skills. It's just going to get way more consistent, higher value stuff. So who doesn't want that? This episode is for you. And it's for the beginner.

Starting point is 00:00:24 I'm not going to be using Claude code. I'm just going to be using the website or if you want to just have the Mac app. we're going to talk about how you can create a custom skill. So the first thing you're going to want to do is actually enable skills. So it doesn't enable it by default. So if you go to settings and then you click capabilities, if you scroll down, you actually could see that there's this skills preview feature. Repeat customizable instructions that Cloud can follow in any chat.

Starting point is 00:00:59 And you can actually add them over here. If you want to create a new skill, it gives you three options. It says, create with clause. build complex skills through conversation, write skill instructions, great for skills that are easy to describe, and then upload a skill. So this is if you actually have a zip already or a skill,

Starting point is 00:01:19 you can just upload it already. But for the vast majority of people, you actually want to just hit, you know, let's create a skill together and says, it basically onboards you to this idea of how to create a skill. So it says, let's create a skill together using your skill creator skill. First, ask me,

Starting point is 00:01:37 what the skill should do. It says, I'll help you create a custom skill. Let me first review the skill creator documentation to guide us through this process. So then it says, perfect, let's create a custom skill. What functionality should this skill provide? For example, it could help with working with the specific formats or data, following particular workflows for your work or projects, integrating with specific tools or APIs, applying domain specific knowledge or procedures,

Starting point is 00:02:06 or something else entirely. So what do I have in mind? So, hmm, that's a good question. I'm going to say, hey there, I run a design agency called LCA. I'm constantly creating new apps and websites. I'd love a skill that reviewed my designs. Actually, we reviewed my, viewed my, viewed my, copywriting on my apps and websites and and critiqued it to get the highest conversion rate

Starting point is 00:02:49 possible. Basically, I want to ship apps that drive revenue, et cetera, and copy helps do that. So basically what I'm trying to do is I want to have almost like a copywriter that's specializes for, you know, apps and websites. And I want to see if I can create a skill that can go and do that. And it says, great idea. A conversion-focused copywriting review skill would be really valuable for your agency. Let me ask you a few questions to understand exactly how you do this. What kind of apps and websites are you typically building?

Starting point is 00:03:29 So I'm going to say, I'm typically building mobile apps. that have AI embedded in it or SaaS. Number two, how would you provide the copy for review? Would you share URLs, HTML shots, HTML files, screenshots. I'm going to say I would share screenshots or Figma files or just paste text, whatever is easiest. for you. So I literally treat it like, you know, I'm talking to an employee. What specific elements do you want critiqued? Headlines, CTAs, value proposition, product descriptions, hero sections, pricing pages, onboarding photos, all the above, all of the above. And what does a helpful review look like to you? Do you want specific suggestions with before and after, a scored assessment, prioritize issues to fix or something else? Actually, that all sounds great. If you have a business that's doing at least $50,000 a month in revenue, I've got something interesting for you.

Starting point is 00:04:46 It's called Offline Mode. It's a two-day event that me and my team are putting on at a 20,000 plus square foot mansion. Yes, this is what it looks like on January 23rd and January 24th in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. I'll include a link in the description if you're interested in coming. But it's basically for people who have a business that's kind of cranking, but they really want to put it in Rocket Ship. mode. They want to create a set of businesses that generate tons of money, tons of cash flow, tons of product market fit, tons of impact, but they're not just quite there yet. It's also about making your business AI first, how you can actually build not just one product but multiple products, and you're going to leave with tactical answers to your questions. So if that's

Starting point is 00:05:35 you, and this sounds interesting, I'll see you there. So you answer it. And it's actually a really good, like before you create, I mean, you should create your first skill, but I think that you should be asking Claude, like which, you know, telling it what you do and giving and asking it to tell you what are the 10 skills that you should be creating. So this would just be one of the skills. So you can see here it says, I have a clear picture now. I'm creating a conversion copywriting review skill for your AI and SaaS. mobile apps, I'll build a skill that reviews all copy elements, headlines, CTAs, value props, provides scored assessments with specific before and

Starting point is 00:06:18 after suggestions, prioritizes issues by impact on conversion, works with screenshots, Figma, files, and paste of text. Let me start by setting up the skill structure and it's gone and it's like, it's building out, building this out. So why this is so important is, you know, yes, you could, um, obviously have this within, within Claude in like one chat, but you lose the context. With the skill, you're getting the consistency and you're just getting better output ultimately because you're getting consistent output that you want, right?

Starting point is 00:06:56 You're giving it the right amount of context and now knows about my business. A common question is, well, why wouldn't I just use a project within Cloud? Well, you could use a project, but projects are context specific for a specific, like, you know, there's a beginning, middle, and an ending date to the project. So, for example, like, maybe you're working on a, you know, Christmas campaign. But after that, you know, the type of copy that, you know, you would do for Christmas campaign, you know, might be different, you know, if you're doing something for Valentine's Day. So I think, you know, think of skills as like you're building like your team a little bit and you need a set of skills that are going to work regardless if you're working on a campaign or if you're working on just, you know, it's sort of like your day-to-day operations. So let's just check in on what's happening here. It says it's building, you know, it's building the skill.

Starting point is 00:07:55 It's starting by setting up the skill structure. Now let me build out the skill with conversion copywriting experts. I'll remove the example files we don't need and create reference materials. Great. And now it says now let me write the main skill MD with the review workflow. So it's, you know, these are markdown files.md, which is really simple. And I saw, I think, someone from Anthropic actually, you know, someone asked them, hey like why did you do markdown files like that's like literally the most basic files ever like

Starting point is 00:08:35 why didn't you do something a little a little you know more complex and they just said that like it works right files work markdown files are super easy to understand if you're non-technical obviously you can really understand it so i'm happy that they that they you know pick such an easy way to actually uh to get involved so you can see here now it's it's sort of at work you can you can actually go and see what it's doing so you know it's it's you know key principles quality standards i mean this is really insane you know like that that this is possible and um and and and and it's gone and and i think it's i think we've got it so it says hey i've created your lCA uh conversion copy review skill here's

Starting point is 00:09:26 what it includes provide expert conversion conversion copywriting reviews for your AI power mobile apps and SaaS. It works with screenshots. Exactly what we said. So it says what's inside. Okay, so it's got the markdown file, skill.md, which is the step-by-step review workflow with scoring system and output template. It's got a conversion framework.md.

Starting point is 00:09:48 So it's got the core frameworks like IADA. I think that's attention, interest, desire, and action. PAS, B, B, these are different frameworks. that I'm happy exist in here and value proposition formulas. Like any good copywriter knows those things. Element guidelines on MD. So it's specific best practices for every copy element. Headlines, calls to action, pricing, etc.

Starting point is 00:10:14 So how it works. When you ask me to review copy, I'll automatically load the conversion frameworks and guidelines. Analyze each element with specific scoring. Prioritized fixes by conversion impact. Critical. medium low and provide before and after examples with psychological rationale and then says to use this upload this dot skill file to clode then just share any app website and ask for conversion review so

Starting point is 00:10:47 we're going to go ahead and do that i'm actually going to go download it um download it here copy i click copy to your skills so i believe we need to go back to to the settings. We're going to go ahead and click settings. And then we go back to capabilities. And here you can see the skills. We have to add the skills. And now is when we upload the skills.

Starting point is 00:11:12 So we're going to go ahead and drag and drop that from downloads. So actually, when I click copy, it put it in there. I wasn't sure about that. So you actually, you know, if you click copy, it automatically puts it there. but I've gone and uploaded it there again. And let's go and start a new chat and see if this works. So, I mean, we're going to need something for it to review. So I'm actually just going to go to like, let's say Cal AI,

Starting point is 00:11:37 which is a popular app for tracking your calories. I'm just going to, you know, screenshot this. Actually, maybe I'll screenshot, yeah, I'm going to screenshot these App Store previews. I'm going to go back. So I'm going to say, hi, please use the conversion review skill to look at these app store screenshots and provide better copy. Actually, I'm also going to give it the website. I'm literally just going to copy and paste. I've also included the website copy, which needs a copy, uh,

Starting point is 00:12:27 review as well. So I'm going to go and see if this actually uses the skill. Hopefully it does. So it says, I'll review your app stores screenshots and website copy for conversion optimization. Let me start by examining the conversion copywriting best practice for your app. So now you can see the agent really is going and working with the skill to give the best possible outcome. Think about if we didn't have the skill. If we didn't have the skill and you're like, make it better, you know, make it sound fresh, make it sound clean, make a conversion rate optimize.

Starting point is 00:13:08 You just wouldn't, you know, it wouldn't get the best output. So here, let's see what happens. CalAI's current copy relies heavily on generic AI messaging without explaining concrete benefits or differ atchee for competitors. The app source screenshots use vague headlines and don't communicate the value proposition. While the website copy Barry's compelling features under technical descriptions, top priorities, rewrite headlines to focus on specific outcomes, clarify the unique AI capability, depth sensor for volume calculation, and lead with transformation rather than features. So it goes and tells you the critical issues. It says the app store screenshots. And let's actually go and let's look at the app store screenshots.

Starting point is 00:13:53 So it says make easy calorie tracking easy with AI. just snap a picture of your food, then let us do the rest. You can see, you know, it's taking a picture of pancakes, and then it says track your progress as you go, protein, carbs, and fats. So it says the issues is too generic.

Starting point is 00:14:15 Every calorie tracker claims to be easy. There's no specific benefit or differentiation. Then let us do the rest is nothing meaningful. So then it gives these alternatives. Option one. Track calories in three seconds. I actually like the three seconds. I think that's really good.

Starting point is 00:14:32 Oh, it did include, by the way, the score. It's pretty harsh. Three on ten, but yeah, track calories in three seconds, no manual logging, get exact portions using iPhone depth sensing. Like, it's obviously better. Why it works.

Starting point is 00:14:48 Specific time frame, three seconds, emphasizes the elimination of friction points, users hate, highlights unique capability, includes concrete multiplayer. I've written copy for some of the largest SaaS businesses apps on the planet. And I cannot agree more with this statement. Option two, so it gives you another option where it's transformation focus. Lost 17 pounds without counting a single calorie.

Starting point is 00:15:14 Your camera calculates everything instantly. See calories, protein carbs in real time. Join 5 million users hitting their goals daily. So leading with success, I think that could be really. cool too. Let's see how it did on the website coffee. So the current copy says meet CalAAI, track your calories with just a picture. It has a lot of issues with it. It says a waste, precious headline space, no emotional hook. The recommended alternatives, the only calorie tracker that actually knows portion sizes. Your iPhone depth sensor measures exact food volume.

Starting point is 00:15:52 So this, I mean, and then it gives you the high priority improvement. and you can just, you know, see this on screen. But the point here is it's done an incredible job here. It goes into medium priority refinements. It says what's working well here. It gives you product considerations and then a summary of what to do. Now, this is awesome. But I saw a tweet from my friend,

Starting point is 00:16:22 boring marketer this morning. and he said something that's really smart around how you can get the most out of Claude skills. So he said, the trick to creating effective skills to make your AI think like an expert, not just to follow steps. So he had as a 10-step process

Starting point is 00:16:40 that I think, you know, is really great. So we've gone ahead and great. Now, anyone listening to this can create a clod skill. But how do you actually make the skill 2x better, 3x better, 4x better, 5x better? You do something like this. And if people want, I can go and do an episode with James the Boring Marketer where we can actually go deeper on this.

Starting point is 00:17:03 Understand what skill, what problem. Step one, right? So we did that, but could we have gotten deeper, you know, with the LLM, probably? Explore, see where Cloud fails without guidance. Step three, research, go deep on the domain. Step four, synthesize, extract principles. from research. Step 5, draft, write initial skill. Step 6, self-critique, review against quality criteria. Step 7, iterate, fix gaps, get feedback, improve. Step 8, test, use skill on a real scenario. Step 9, finalize, codify into an optimal

Starting point is 00:17:44 structure. What does this mean? It says, you know, make Claude think like an expert, not follow steps. produce output not intermediate documents sounds like a practitioner not documentation constrain ruthlessly every section earns its place the point here is that once you've created your first skill or your second skill or your third skill skills aren't something that you aren't you know making better over time so as you see the output let's say I didn't like the output of what I got I can go ahead and edit the skill you know now that I have it I can just go and edit it and add to it and change it and iterate from there. So I want to keep this episode short and it's, you know, because today, today was just about like how you can create

Starting point is 00:18:31 your first few skills. And, and, but once you have that, the second step is iterating on those skills so that it really, really, it's like an employee that knows you. You don't even need to like tell it what to do, right? That's like what you want to get to. That it just constantly delight. And that's step two. You're iterating on the skills, getting the most out of them. And then step three is using it within a platform like ClaudeCode. We've shown today around, you know, just using it on the web, on the Mac app. But you could use it within the terminal. And that's really where you're going to get the most amount of control in it.

Starting point is 00:19:15 So hope this was helpful. you know, I do these practical AI tutorials because, you know, I think that we have a lot of ideas. And, you know, this is this is the startup ideas podcast. And it's about how you can get those ideas out of your head and actually create something that people love. And I think a big part of that is having, you know, using things like skills to your advantage. So hope this is helpful. please like, comment and subscribe. I literally read every single comment and respond to most.

Starting point is 00:19:52 So I hope this was helpful. Happy holidays and have a creative day.

The Startup Ideas Podcast - Set Up Claude Skills in 21 Mins (for Non-Technical People)

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